Some packet forwarding devices can perform link aggregation for higher bandwidth circuits, resilience, and load balancing by forming a link aggregation group (LAG) of physical ports. For example, the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) 802.3AD and IEEE 802.1AX define standards for some examples of link aggregation. By appropriately configuring a packet forwarding device, the physical ports and the link connected to them are logically coupled together to form a bundled set between two or more network nodes. The LAG then has a larger capacity than the individual member links of the LAG. The packet forwarding device can use an algorithm for traffic distribution across the member links. For example, some packet forwarding devices support a layer 2 based distribution mechanism based on hashing at least a portion of the layer 2 addresses or layer 3 or 4 addresses based distribution mechanisms often hashing some layer 3 or layer 4 information in the packets or traffic flow and using the hash results directly or indirectly to determine an output link.
Under certain circumstances, the resulting distribution of traffic across the member links of a LAG may not meet some system requirements or can lead to sub-optimal performance in some way. Accordingly, there exists a need for packet forwarding devices configured for further refinement of the traffic distribution across the member links of a LAG.